The Tide Recedes
The ship sailed through the inky waters all night.
As dawn broke, the color of the seawater around the ship began to slowly change, like a dark fabric being gradually lifted to reveal a lighter-colored lining underneath. The inky color faded slowly, gradually lightening from the bow towards the stern, until, by the time the sun was fully up, the seawater around the ship had returned to the normal deep blue color of the open sea. But the color of the seawater ahead was still different from that behind—a lighter, brighter band of color spread out at the horizon, like a light-colored field directly illuminated by the morning light waiting for them on the sea ahead.
After daybreak, the person at the stern adjusted the rudder, guiding the boat along the light-colored band. The boat's speed didn't decrease as it approached the band; it maintained its speed, like sliding from one medium into another similar but subtly different one, without any noticeable change in rate. Long Tian stood up from the bow, gazed at the light-colored band for a moment, then squatted down, took out the tide record from his bag, flipped to the last page, and compared the current time and speed to estimate the time difference between the remaining voyage and the Moon Tide window. He closed the record, put it back in his bag, stood up, and looked again at the light-colored band. Its color at the horizon was gradually changing from light blue to a more grayish-white hue, like a thin layer covering the water's surface fading.
Around noon, the ship entered the area of the lighter-colored zone. The seawater changed from deep blue to grayish-blue, then to a near-silver hue, reflecting a uniform light under the midday sun. The sound of the current under the ship became more even in this area, without the short, sharp fluctuations and pauses that often occurred in the dark waters, as if entering a channel with a uniform flow. The person at the stern loosened the rudder slightly, allowing the ship to move along the current on its own. He glanced into the water from the side of the ship and said to Long Tian, "The color of the bottom has changed. The bottom was dark in that area before, but the reflected light in this area is lighter, as if a light-colored layer is approaching the surface."
Long Tian walked from the bow to the side of the ship and looked down. Under the direct sunlight, he could see a flat surface some distance below the water's surface, lighter in color than the surrounding seawater. Its edges were straight, like a flattened table waiting for the water level to drop enough to expose it. The water was not yet deep enough to reveal the surface, but the transparency of the water allowed its outline to be vaguely discernible from the ship's deck, like a large, light-colored painting placed on the seabed, constantly appearing and disappearing with the continuous ripples.
He walked back to the bow along the ship's side, squatted down, and dipped his hand into the water. The water temperature was slightly higher in this area than on the outer edges; he could feel a layer of water, even warmer than the surface, surging upwards from below the hull, like a continuous warm current rising from the cracks in the underwater structure. He didn't linger, pulling his hand back to dry on his knees before glancing at the sky. The sun was setting, and the tide window was still about seven or eight hours away. He planned to use this time to recover his strength, so he gestured to the stern. The person at the stern understood and slightly reduced the ship's speed, keeping it hovering in the light-colored zone. Long Tian leaned against the ship's side and closed his eyes for a while, while Yu Jin sat against the cabin wall. The light from the dark gray bead wasn't very noticeable in the light above the sea. The two rested for a while in their respective spots on the ship.
As dusk fell and the sun dipped near the horizon, Long Tian opened his eyes. He stood up and walked to the gunwale to look down—the light-colored underwater plane was closer to the surface than it had been in the afternoon, as if the tide was steadily and evenly receding. He crouched down by the gunwale and dipped his hand into the water. When his fingertips touched the water, he felt that the temperature was more concentrated than before, and the current was faster than it had been in the afternoon. It was as if the entire water layer was moving in one direction at a perceptible speed, evenly removing the layer of water covering that plane.
As darkness fell completely, the underwater plane was now only an arm's length below the surface. It was a smooth, whitish stone surface with clearly visible edges, extending into a continuous area within the illumination range of the boat's hull. The Dragon Shadow descended from above the bow to a height close to the water's surface. The light from its forehead shone through the water layer onto the stone surface, creating a uniform bright area under the scattering of the water, revealing part of the underwater stone surface's structure—flat, continuous, and free of sediment, as if repeatedly washed by the Moon Tide, maintaining a clean texture through continuous rinsing, like a regularly cleaned countertop.
After midnight, the Moon Tide receded at its fastest. The underwater stone surface gradually emerged from the water as the tide continued to recede. It started from the highest point, like a board being slowly lowered by the water, then gradually expanded towards the edges. By the deepest hour of the morning, the entire stone platform was completely exposed to the air, gleaming with a uniform light gray sheen under the moonlight, like a meticulously maintained surface awaiting the first footsteps under the moon's gaze. A clean cut ran along the edge of the platform, like the cross-section of a sculpted stone, forming a clear dividing line under the moonlight, connecting to the deeper water below. In the center of the platform, there was a vertical... A wide ridge extends along the centerline from one end to the other, its surface flat and about a hand's width above the platform, like a long, narrow structure embedded in the surface. The platform's end converges in front of an arched wall of the same material, about a person's height above the platform, with a narrow, vertical slit running through its center. The slit is about a finger's width wide, the same height as the wall, and has straight edges, like an unopened door that perpetually retains the possibility of being opened. Long Tian stood up at the bow, stepped onto the gunwale, and flipped off the ship, landing on the stone platform. The soft sound of his boots touching the dry stone echoed across the open sea, quickly carried away by the wind without a sound.